Celebrating Van Gogh's Mulberry Tree and Endless Summers (Vol. 9, No. 2)

Van Gogh, La Méridienne oú La sieste, d'apres Millet

Could Chopin ever be friends with Vincent Van Gogh? If thinking of their personal style and social circles, the answer should be: absolutely not! Chopin was a Parisian dandy, wearing elegant, tailor-made clothes and appearing in salons of the aristocracy. He was a teacher of princesses and a friend of princes. In contrast, Van Gogh lived a simple, provincial life in southern France, wandered through the fields, or sat sharing meals with peasants in a local tavern.

Chopin's birthplace in Zelazowa Wola near Warsaw. Vintage Postcard. 

Yet, the intensity of the art of both creative souls indicates a spiritual and creative affinity. Deep inside, they were kindred spirits, it seems to me - sensitive, emotional, lonely, somewhat embittered and incessantly creating, completely dedicated to their art. Also, they both loved the open fields in the summer...Many of Chopin's letters from rainy, grey Paris to his family in Poland contain notes on nostalgia for the childhood summers in the village - with folk music, sunlight, and fun!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUHmr7ZCSoI (Chopin's Mazurka Op. 7 No. 1, played by Artur Rubinstein)

Reconstruction of the double portrait of Chopin and Sand by Delacroix, 1838.

Chopin's death-bed by Teofil Kwiatkowski, 1849

Chopin loved art and artists - his best friends included Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) who painted the famous double portrait of Chopin and George Sand, later split into two, and Teofil Kwiatkowski (1809-1891) who painted the composer at his death-bed, surrounded by family and artistic friends. He valued highly the art of Auguste Clesinger, a sculptor who later married George Sand's daughter, Solange (Chopin took their side against Sand) and, after the composer's death, designed his tombstone in Paris. 

Chopin's tomb with sculpture by Clesinger

Mentions of painters are rarely found in Chopin's letters to family or friends, though in an early letter, the 15-year old pianist writes about his own artistic efforts. On August 26, 1825 from Szafarnia to family in Warsaw, Fryderyk mentioned his sketch of a folk musician from the village, that he drew after witnessing an impressive harvest performance by villagers. He refers to himself as possibly being a "painter, blinded to the quality of his own work." The most notable part of the letter, however, is its extensive description of the folk performance: hearing the music live in the village provided Chopin with a life-long inspiration for composing mazurkas and stylizing village music into high art. 

Another famous letter to family, of 18-20 July 1845, written from Nohant, is filled with descriptions of sculptures as part of artistic news from France. While the letter mentions some artists by name, its title to fame lies in its discussion of nostalgia and remembering Poland's fields in rainy Paris - being in "imaginary spaces" (espaces imaginaires) of the heart. It clearly reveals the homesickness and loneliness of the composer, even surrounded by nature on the beautiful summer estate in Nohant. 

The Anthology is now available on Amazon.com

Paintings by Van Gogh inspired many poets, most recently gathered in an anthology Resurrection of a Sunflower (2016) edited by Catfish McDaris and published by Pski's Porch.  I was thrilled to have three poems included in that almost 600 page brick of a book. It is available at the Van Gogh Museum in Holland and online, if you want to know what paintings most inspired the poets.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvqFOEPgJQU (Mazurka Op. 7 No. 2, by Artur Rubinstein)

My "Mulberry Song" published in "Resurrection of  a Sunflower" was reprinted on the Poetry Laurels Blog in May 2017 - and it is found below.
http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2017/05/celebrating-poetry-in-poetry-month.html

Another poem that I wrote "after" a Van Gogh's painting is entitled "Azure" and was inspired by  La Méridienne oú La sieste, d'apres Millet from 1890 - an astounding painting of azure, sapphires and gold yellows that I saw in Paris in 2014 (see the image above). Since, my blog also reports on Monet's Waterlilies with a cycle of poems inspired by those amazing paintings, and contains tons of photos from Paris, I'm reproducing the poem below.
http://poetrylaurels.blogspot.com/2014/05/lilie-and-konwalie-in-paris-monet.html

      Azure

         ~ after Noon by Van Gogh and Millet

     Half of the day's work is done.

     She curls into a ball by his side

     He stretches up, proudly thinking

     of the bread they will bake,

     the children they will feed.

     Noon rays dance on the straw

     they cut with their sickles 

     to finish the harvest when the sky 

     is still the bluest of summer azure.

     She took the first fistful of stems 

     solemnly, among the rolling waves 

     of wheat ocean. She made a figurine,

     placed it high up on the wooden fence 

     overlooking their fields. She learned

     it from her mother, her mother before her,

     generations reaching back to that first 

     handful of grain, droplets of wine 

     and water spilled at its feet. 

     The offering for the goddess of harvest. 

     They move together in consort

     in the white gold of silence.

     They rest together, two pieces

     in a puzzle of bread to come.

(c) 2016 by Maja Trochimczyk, published in Resurrection of a Sunflower 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iIAD1Juaz4 (Mazurka Op. 17 no. 2,  played by Yundi)

In 2013, the creative writing group I belong to, the Westside Women Writers, held a workshop dedicated to Van Gogh's paintings. Two of them, in fact: selected from Van Gogh holdings at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena.  We wrote about Winter and about The Mulberry Tree. Here are poems about The Mulberry Tree that will appear in the Westside Women Writers anthology, "Grateful Conversations" (edited by Kathi Stafford and Maja Trochimczyk, forthcoming from Moonrise Press).

The Mulberry Tree by Vincent Van Gogh at the Norton Simon Museum

Wild Hair

Millicent Borges Accardi


Yellow mustard moss, green white
Gray lines.
A blue box learning
Up against the tree
Or perhaps a leather
mail bag
Near by.
Each stroke, a finger
Print,
A pushing back
of thick
Paint
The curl of a brush end
For leaves
And puffs of colorful
smoldering.

Millicent Borges Accardi's new poetry collection may be found on Amazon: Only More So @ Amazon and more information about her on her website:

 http://www.MillicentBorgesAccardi.com

Another poet inspired by The Mulberry Tree, Madeleine S. Butcher, imagined a lovely scene in the countryside, while Vincent painted and a child kept him company:

Sophie and Vincent

(after Van Gogh’s painting “The Mulberry Tree”)

Madeleine S. Butcher

It could be that this mulberry tree

is low enough for a child to climb

for a fine hiding place 

to survey her domain 

of far hills and reaching fields.

She might hide from her nurse

who is calling her name,

a wee figure almost gone - past the long fields -

her white apron flies up like a miniature flag.

And so this child becomes part of a branch

so still she is, sitting above 

in the tangle of limbs 

under cover of leaves

waiting for her friend in their mulberry tree -

with his satchel of chalks and charcoal and pens

who sits by the trunk in his wide-brimmed hat

fingering his pastels, ruffling the paper

and slowly, he too,  grows quiet and still, 

gazing out at the fields and the following hills,

their silent domain.

The afternoon moves along

to the swirl of  leaves and buzzing bees,

the soft grit of chalk, the scratch of pen

the heel of his hand blending sky to earth

wind to cloud, branch to leaf -

fields and sheltering hills. 

The afternoon moves along with the sun

and an occasional shiver of limb and leaf 

as mulberries are picked and many are eaten

but most are dropped in a perfect lazy rhythm,

down straight down on his wide-brimmed hat.

(c) by Madeleine S. Butcher, forthcoming in "Grateful Conversations" anthology

Kathi Stafford, the co-editor of the "Grateful Conversations" anthology, saw in the painting something quite different.

Mulberry                                                              

Kathi Stafford

               There is no blue without yellow and without orange.  
               ~Vincent Van Gogh


The branches flare out. They'll go so dead
in winter that one will think, What can come back
from that? But Lazarus arms surge unbound
in spring. Now the surface blurs orange and yellow,
purple fruit hidden in the air. A cauldron whirls

Deep beyond the woods.  Mitten-shaped leaves
paw what the bark stands down, as an autumn
brush heads  to closure. What can arise from
this consistent loss?  A plain mystery shows itself
in the roots, twisted, Medusa hair swirling 

Asps into the cold air. The tree collides with night,
stars and all.  Fence posts built from the Mulberry,
haphazard in night air.  Fruit       bark        hues
blaze in a bounty.  I hold them in my hands

as well.  Precious are the stripes of the wounded tree.

(c) 2013 by Kathi Stafford, forthcoming in "Grateful Conversations" 

For me, the Mulberry Tree is a supernova, exploding in an invitation to stop and feel the connection to Cosmos:

The Mulberry Song

~ after van Gogh’s Mulberry Tree at the Norton Simon Museum

Maja Trochimczyk

I am the mulberry tree, ablaze with color
before the last day of autumn

I came into being in a flurry of brush strokes
on a cardboard, under the azure expanse of unfinished sky

turquoise – into cobalt – into indigo
green – into chartreuse – into amber – into gold

buds into blossoms – into fruit – into earth
to fall – to fall not – to end – to end not –

to begin

The brightest star, an ancient supernova,
I am aglow but for a moment

I outshine reality with artifice
exploding off the canvas

paint – paintbrush – swansong

leaves of the earth – ripples in the stream – crystals in the air –
aflame, all aflame

I make magic of the mundane shape of the world
sic est gloria mundi

it is – it will be – it is willed to be –
once captured in a frenzy of light, becoming

time transfigured into swirls of awareness
crystallizing at the edge of oblivion

I am the mulberry tree – I am the alchemist tree –
let my song fill your day till it glows –

become pure gold with me

(C) 2016 by Maja Trochimczyk

The Mulberry Tree painting was so inspirational, that I dedicated another poem to this out-of-this-world tree - and it was recently published in the "Eclipse Moon" - an anthology of the Southern California Haiku Study Group edited by William Scott Galasso (2017).

 Vincent’s Mulberry Tree

There are no seasons in the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, or rather it is always the beginning of autumn, when you approach the blazing mulberry tree of Vincent Van Gogh.  It came into being on a piece of cardboard, in a flurry of brush strokes, under the azure expanse of unfinished sky. I see the bare cardboard peek from under the cobalt and indigo traces, layered briskly by Vincent’s  paintbrush, in a frenzy of passion. This tree is the brightest star, an ancient supernova: it glows, but for a moment. Yet, it outshines reality with artifice, exploding off the wall, imprinting itself onto my retina, to endlessly flourish in my mind.  I come back two months later, and there it is, still exploding, still golden, still dancing in a frenzy of light, 

time transfigured into
gold swirls of awareness –
the alchemy of art
__________________________

  The anthology took its title from a haiku by Diana Ming Jeong: 

  eclipse moon
  an abyss forged
  over time

Now that we have returned to  moonlight, it is time to listen to a nocturne (Op. 9 No. 2, illustrated with Van Gogh's "Starry Night"): 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9E6b3swbnWg

Homage to Alexander Tansman Conference in Wroclaw, Poland (Vol. 8, No. 4)

On March 13-14, 2017, International conference Homage to Aleksander Tansman (1897-1986) will celebrate the 120th anniversary of the composer’s birth. The conference will take place at the Karol Lipinski Academy of Music in Wroclaw, Poland and will gather an international array of scholars from Poland, France, and the U.S.  The poster and program of the conference are reproduced below. Tansman was one of the most prolific and fascinating composers of mazurkas, and other piano genres developed by Chopin. In fact, he even wrote a Homage a Chopin! So it is fitting to post this information here....

Music on YouTube: Rhapsoide hebraique for piano

Music on YouTube: Le tour de monde en miniature (first part, Malicki)

MORE INFORMATION:

Tansman Society in Poland - Festivals and Competition of Musical Personalities

http://tansman.lodz.pl/en/festival-2016

Les Amis d' Alexandre Tansman, Paris

http://www.alexandre-tansman.com/

A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY 

(FROM USC POLISH MUSIC CENTER)

Aleksander (or Alexandre) Tansman (b. Łódz, 1897; d. Paris, 1986) was a composer, conductor, and pianist. He studied at the Lodz Conservatory (with Piotr Rytel) and took courses in law and philosophy at Warsaw University. In 1919 he settled in Paris where he met the leading artists of his time, including Maurice Ravel, Igor Stravinsky, and others. As a pianist he toured Europe, Canada, and the Middle East with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Serge Koussevitzky. His music was performed by the most famous soloists and ensembles of his time; his champions included conductors Stokowski and Toscanini. 

During this stage of his life, Tansman frequently described himself as "un compositeur polonais" but spoke French at home with his French wife - a talented pianist, Colette Cras - and two daughters (Tansman's first wife, also French, died early in their marriage). Returning to Warsaw was not an issue because of marriage and career requirements. Tansman was a world-famous virtuoso who frequently performed with the greatest orchestras and conductors, mostly based in France. 

The political situation in Poland was also a factor. In the 1930s a growing wave of anti-semitism swept through Poland; after World War II, the policies of the communist regime included provocations and mass persecutions (1946, 1968) coupled with purposeful eradication of the remnants of Jewish culture. In both periods, Poland was not a country that an established Jewish composer from France would want to return to. While living in France, Tansman did not seek out the Polish community for cultural companionship; instead, he enjoyed being a member of Europe's cultural elite, the international musical establishment. Since his arrival in Paris he was a protégé of Maurice Ravel, and a socialite, on friendly terms with the whole artistic world. 

Music on YouTube: Four Polish Dances (orchestral version)

Music on YouTube: Sonatine transatlantique (piano), foxtrot

Sonatine transatlantique (piano, Daniel Blumenthal) foxtrot

 Sonatine transatlantique (piano, Daniel Blumenthal), spiritual and blues.

Sonatine transatlantique, charleston (Daniel Blumenthal)

Music on YouTube: Symfonie Concertante (Symphony No. 3, 1931)

Tansman survived the war in the United States. After Hitler's army attacked France and the Vichy government began deporting Jews, Tansman's French wife protected him while they awaited for an American visa, granted thanks to incredible efforts of Tansman's American friends, Charlie Chaplin, Serge Koussevitzky, Arturo Toscanini, Jasha Heifetz, and many others. 

What was his reaction to his new country? He remained an outsider at heart, observing the follies and vagaries of his host nation at a distance and with a slight dislike, much like Bela Bartók. Their comments about how ridiculous the American ways were, are somewhat similar in tone - with an echo of a European feeling of superiority, and a contempt for the brazen and uncultured money-making business people. Yet, Tansman thoroughly enjoyed his life in Hollywood, which he described as an ideal community of artists, a kind of a "contemporary Weimar" (in an interview translated by Jill Timmons and Sylvain Fremaux and published online in Polish Music Journal, vol. 1 no. 1, Summer 1998).

Music on YouTube: Piano Sonata No. 4 (dedicated to Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge, 1941)

Recorded by Etcetera, excerpts:

1. Allegro deciso (Daniel Blumenthal)

2. Andante sostenuto (Daniel Blumenthal)

3. Adagio lamentoso (Daniel Blumenthal)

The decision to go home to France may have been ill-fated for Tansman's career. The post-war years are marked by a growing artistic isolation of this self-proclaimed Polish composer, who distrusted avant-garde trends and remained faithful to the aesthetics of neoclassicism. Nationalism and avant-garde triumphs in France coupled with a cultural isolationism in Poland, where - as an emigrant who remained in the West - he was not performed and not well known for years, caused a gradual disappearance of Tansman's music from the spotlight.

Yet, he continued to compose music of increasing artistic merit and historical significance (opera Serment; oratorio Isaiah, The Prophet, Hommage a Chopin, symphonies, concertos, etc.). The need to reaffirm personal roots, which were earlier overshadowed by an allegiance to Polish culture and the cosmopolitan music world, resulted also in the creation of what Tansman considered one of his best works, the opera Sabbatai Zevi, le faux Messie (1958). 

While returning to his Jewish heritage, Tansman continued seeing himself as a Polish composer, keenly interested in the matters of his home country ["kraj rodzinny" in his letters]. Stylized versions of Polish dances, especially the mazurka, were a staple in his compositional repertoire; in 1980, for instance, he wrote a Mazurka for Lech Walesa. 

Since 1996, an organization dedicated solely to furthering his cause and promoting his music emerged under the leadership of Andrzej Wendland. The Fundacja Kultury im. A. Tansmana organizes the Tansman Performance Competitions, Tansman Festivals, and other events associated with the composer.  The Foundation commissioned Henryk Mikolaj Gorecki to write a symphonic work for its festival; instead this composition become Gorecki's last symphony, Symphony No. 4 "Tansman Episodes"- including a musical epigram of Tansman's name quoted as a motive. On the occasion of the symphony's premiere in 2014, the Los Angeles Philharmonic posted a short film about Tansman on its website. It is now available on the Tansman Foundation website.  Andrzej Wendland documents this history in his book about the symphony and its connections to Tansman. 

Music on YouTube: Hommage a Chopin (guitar)

Tansman Bio on YouTube (2014): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROLBDPJZzDI

OVERVIEW OF THE MUSIC

Tansman repeatedly expressed the conviction that his music is rooted in Polish culture, and he included Polish dances, rhythms, and topics in many pieces (e.g. cycles of Mazurkas, the Polish Rhapsody, works inspired by and dedicated to Chopin). Throughout his career, Tansman expressed his Polishness in music by composing more mazurkas, polonaises and obereks than almost any other composer after Chopin. His music created a new link in the history of this genre (studied by Barbara Milewski in the U.S. and Anna Nowak in Poland).

An example of his folk-music settings may be provided by Quatre danses polonaises of 1931. The orchestral version of this work was first conducted in the U.S. by Arturo Toscanini. The last segment of the cycle could be said to epitomize Tansman as a Polish neoclassical composer: in this arrangement of the "oberek" the main theme is presented in a fugato, while the drones, harmonies, and melodies continue to mirror features of Polish folklore. Some of his piano pieces are very virtuosic (e.g. Etude-Scherzo) other works border on the entertaining and vacuous salon music (e.g. Le tour de monde en miniature cycle of miniatures).

The composer cherished his Jewish heritage, expressing it in many works written throughout his career, e.g., the Hebrew Rhapsody (1938), oratorio Isaiah The Prophet (1950), Apostrophe to Sion (1978), and other pieces. In 1933, he composed a Hebrew Rhapsody (in two versions, with the piano one dedicated to the composer's mother). This work was inspired by ancient melodies from Yemen, and began as an arrangement of these songs that so delighted the composer. After the war the composer worked on a monumental oratorio, Isaiah, The Prophet (for voices, mixed choir , and orchestra, 1950). There is much to be admired in this stark and complex work, cantorial singing style interspersed with sombre choral fugues and dramatic orchestral interludes. It is a compelling piece that badly needs a new recording.

One of the instruments that he favoured was the guitar for which he composed numerous Polish dances, e.g, Suite in Modo Polonico. The Suite (1962), commissioned by and dedicated to "the king of guitarists," Andres Segovia, may be considered the crowning achievement among Tansman's works for guitar. Segovia had requested the inclusion of several earlier works in this suite, such as the Mazurek of 1925, the Berceuse d'Orient, and Alla polaca of 1954. The celebrated guitarist recorded this virtuosic set of 10 short pieces five times and performed it during many concert tours, establishing the Suite as one of the staples of the guitar repertoire.

Tansman's songs blend traits of his elegant neoclassicism with expressiveness; his harmonic inventiveness underlies the rich piano accompaniments. His Cinq melodies pour chant et piano (1927) use French texts by the composer's first wife, Anna Eleonora; the songs are dedicated to personal friends and family members. For instance the fourth song, (Chats de gouttiere), is a humorous complaint against the brother of Tansman's wife who had just emigrated to the U.S. The lyricism and humor of Anna Tansman's texts is reflected in the music including national influences (no.2), elements of a stylized lullaby (no. 3), and an almost romantic poignancy (no. 5).

In general, Tansman's music belongs to the broadly defined realm of neoclassicism, enriched by a plurality of influences and models, including jazz, folk dances, and the music of the Far East. The author of a Javanese Dance, he also composed a Blues, an Oberek, and the virtuosic Mazurka & Toccata. During the post-war years he displayed no interest in avant-garde experimentation and remained faithful to his unique brand of the neoclassical style. Tansman's extensive list of works contains compositions for the stage (operas and ballets), pieces for orchestra, chamber music, and songs in several languages. His music links intuition and spontaneity with a logical order of structure, virtuosity, and elegance. His individual style is characterized by clarity of form, lyrical expression, and the use of rich and varied instrumental colors.

TANSMAN ABOUT HIS MUSIC

"Thus, I spent the first twenty years of my life in Poland. In regard to the importance of Slavic influence in my music, I can readily say that I followed the same path as Bartók or Manuel de Falla: folklore imaginé. I did not use popular themes per se. I used, however, their general melodic contour. Polish folklore is abundantly rich. I think that, along with Spanish folklore, it is the richest in possibilities. I was familiar with Polish folklore very early. My nanny used to sing peasant songs that were anonymous."

"They were not contemporary urban songs but songs that came from the villages. This folklore remained strongly present in my musical sensitivity but only as folklore imaginé. I have never used an actual Polish folk song in its original form, nor have I tried to reharmonize one. I find that modernizing a popular song spoils it. It must be preserved in its original harmonization. But Polish character is not solely expressed through folklore. There is something intangible in my music that reveals an aspect of my Polish origin". [Tansman, radio Interviews edited by Timmons/Fremaux, 1967-1980, published in the Polish Music Journal, online 1998)]

Long Live the Mazurka! Dancing with the Prusinowski Trio (Vol. 4, No. 11)

The mazurka is not dead! I was thrilled to say it, again and again, after attending a concert of Janusz Prusinowski Trio at EUropean Jazz @ UCLA on October 10, 2013 at Schoenberg Hall in Los Angeles. The fact that the performance was included in a jazz series was interesting, because of the question of genre or style that arises when listening to the music that is perfectly suited for dancing, yet modern and original. The CD, with its cover reproduced above, includes music and some Mazurka recipes, linking the dance to the Easter cake, just like I have done in my poem "How to make a mazurka" that commemorates my grandparents' talents - my grandma's cooking the mazurkas and my grandpa's playing them. I loved dancing around in a darkening room, with my shadow on the walls, while my grandpa played obereks and mazurkas on his violin, still with ribbons after playing at a wedding...

How to Make a Mazurka

Maja Trochimczyk

                           After Mazurka in A Minor, Op. 17, No. 4,

                        for my Grandparents, Stanisław and Marianna Wajszczuk,

                        who could play and bake their mazurkas like no one else

           Take one cup of longing

for the distant home that never was,

one cup of happiness that danced

with your shadows on the walls

of Grandpa’s house, while he played

a rainbow of folk tunes

on his fiddle, still adorned

with last wedding’s ribbons

            mix it – round and round to dizziness

stir in some golden buzz of the bees

in old linden tree, add the ascent

of skylark above spring rye fields,

singing praises to the vastness of blue

            mix it – round and round to dizziness

add chopped walnuts, figs, dates

and raisins, pour in some juice

from bittersweet grapefruit

freshly picked in your garden

            mix it – round and round to dizziness

  

add dark grey of rainclouds in Paris

that took Chopin back to the glimmer

of candles in an old cemetery

on the evening of All Souls’ Day

            mix it – round and round to dizziness

bake it in the cloudless heat

of your exile, do not forget to sprinkle

with a dollop of sparkling crystals,

first winter’s snowflakes at midnight 

 Here's more information about this astounding group from their website:

"Janusz Prusinowski Trio is a group of musicians who follow in traditions of village masters they have learned from: Jan Lewandowski, Kazimierz Meto, Józef Zaraś, Piotr and Jan Gaca, Tadeusz Kubiak and many others – but they are also an avant-garde band with their own characteristic sound and language of improvisation. They combine music with dance and the archaic with the modern."

 "The Trio’s unique style is the result of their attempt to find new ways of interpreting the most important elements of village music from central Poland. It brings together mazurkas – sung, played, danced to, improvised live – and modern man. What new quality can be given to archaic and seemingly simple melodies and rhythms without resorting to trendy sample mixing? It turns out that traditional music of Polish villages can be a reference point for a variety of genres: reminiscent of Chopin in its melodic pattern and the use of rubato, sharing a love of improvisation with blues and jazz, evocative of contemporary music in its tone, and possessing the expressiveness of rock music."

"Besides playing concerts with traditional Polish music the band prepared a special programme of performances “The village roots of Frédéric Chopin’s music” with pianist Janusz Olejniczak. In 2012 Trio begun a unique project "Kujawy” with three masters of Polish music: Tadeusz Kubiak, Tomasz Stańko, Janusz Olejniczak, and a group of singers led by Ewa Grochowska.The group also performed with Michał Urbaniak, Artur Dutkiewicz and Alim Qasimov. Apart of concerts, Trio’s music can be heard at the parties of village and urban Dance Clubs or theatrical performances at the Polish National Theatre and the Polish Radio Theatre. They also run musical and dance workshops. In 2008 the band released “Mazurkas”, an album which received rave reviews. This was followed in 2010 by their second album “Heart”. 

This information, copied from the website www.januszprusinowskitrio.pl offers just a glimpse of the allure and impact of the Prusinowski Trio. They were a part of the Chopin Year 2010, and here's one Mazurka they played for the year that also saw the publication of Chopin with Cherries. 




What I found most fascinating about the Prusinowski Trio (apart from the fact that it is not a Trio, but has up to five or more members), after attending the UCLA concert, was their ability to bring folklore and Polish national dances back to life as a relevant and popular genres of contemporary dance music.  Why should Polish youth only dance to American or British hit songs and their Polish imitations? Why should a dance genre as old as the nation be abandoned for the sake of foreign imports? This conflict of the native versus the foreign, the patriotic versus the cosmopolitan has played out in Polish cultural history many times.  We all remember the famous lament of Juliusz Slowacki addressing his homeland: Pawiem narodow bylas i papuga..." ((You were the peacock of the nation and a parrot)...

With the Prusinowski Trio, Poland's dance traditions certainly do not fall under the "parroting" label, as their music is clearly, and laudably "roots" music reaching back to the deepest traditions of Polish folklore, and bringing it back to the concert stages nationally and around the world.  Their set of instruments is very traditional: violin, big drum and tambourine, accordion, clarinet (shawm), cello/double bass, cembalom.... The model is that of a folk kapela: fiddle, drum, basetla...  They know ethnographers, such as Piotr Dahlig the director of ethnographic collections at the Institute of Arts of Poland. They are friends with jazz musicians and artists. They play for dance parties, weddings, private get togethers, and on concert stages around the world. They organize dance parties where people dance to their music, where they celebrate their roots with their "wild music of Polish villages."

What makes their music so irresistible? Someone could say that it is "the wonderfully wiggly cross-rhythms – a triple beat but with stresses that can cross it in fours, fives or sevens – of the village mazureks (mazurkas) from Mazovia, Poland’s flat central region, played, with great skill and tremendous lift, by fiddler and occasional cymbalist Janusz Prusinowski, with baraban drum, tambourine and droning 3-string bass from Piotr Piszcatowski, joined by Michal Zak’s wild shawm and flute." (quoted from an article in fRoots Magazine 2011 by Andrew Cronshaw).  The reviewer cites, in turn Janusz Prusinowski's moment of discovery of folk fiddling in Poland:  “It was a revelation: the authenticity, intensity and ease that I had been looking for throughout the world existed right here, beside me, in my own language.”

For others, the music's appeal is heard in the wild, intensely emotional timbres of their instruments. The hollow beating of the drum, the spiky accents on the basetla, the florid ornamentation of the lead fiddler, and the wild, outrageous sound of the shawm... Their sound world has the roughness and intensity of electric guitars and drums of rock bands. It is very far, indeed, from the polished, "beautified" folklore of Polish State Folk Ensembles, that created an ersatz of the real thing and transformed folklore into a Broadway style revue. That "Stalinist" appropriation of Poland's root music has started in early 1950s and has turned youth away from their tradition, transformed into a propaganda vehicle for the glories of PRL. I discussed the impact that these ensembles had on the Polish folk dance movements in America in a book  (Polish Dance in Southern California) and in an article, published in Polish American Studies, and reprinted, in a shorter, less academic version in the Cosmopolitan Review.  Finally, this bonanza for the artificial replacing the original has neared its end; the government is not inclined to invest a fortune into perpetrating of this old style model.  Enter the Prusinowski Trio.  . .

When I spoke with some of the musicians after the concert, they discussed the similarities of Polish folklore to the music of the Balkans and even of Turkey. The mentioned the polska dance of Sweden, and the mazurkas of France and Mexico.  They are fascinated by the international reach of Polish dances in history; and today, contribute to this dissemination by their own art.

In terms of sonorities, the shawm, especially, sounds rough and screeching, sure to be heard over long distances - like the janissary bands of the Ottoman Empire. This was the one sound that I did not remember from my childhood - dancing to the music of my Grandpa, a folk fiddler. The beating of the drum and the droning of the basetla permeate it all, steady and relentless, like the rhythm of the heart - I transliterated it as "I do, I do, I do..." in one love poem. The lively lines of the violin twist and turn, and move the listeners' feet to follow onto the dance floor. During the concert, one musician got off the stage and started rotating around the aisles with a woman, whom I was certain he knew before - and maybe even was part of the setup - they danced together so well! "Yes, they knew each other... No, they did not practice that dance. It just happened."  Here's a wish that these types of spontaneous dance moments happen more and more both in Poland and abroad...

The group has issued so far three CDs:  Mzurki (Mazurkas),2008;  Serce (Heart), 2010; and Po kolana w niebie (Knee-deep in Heaven), 2013. I  reproduced their covers here. These are masterly albums, highly recommended for all music lovers.  I will be writing about specific tunes and rythms on this blog. For now it should suffice to say that the Trio is intimately involved with the Mazurkas of the World Foundation, directed by Prusinowski as well.

Chopin at the AMS/SMT Conference in New Orleans (Vol. 3, No. 12)

References to Chopin's music abounded during many sessions of the Joint Meeting of the American Musicological Society, Society for Music Theory, and Society for Ethnomusicology held recently in New Orleans, LA.

Special AMS Session on Chopin's music was scheduled for Thursday, November 1, 2012. Chaired and organized by Prof. Jeffrey Kalberg (University of Pennsylvania), the sessionw was called "Chopin Revisited" and featured three papers by Chopin scholars:

1. Nationalizing the Kujawiak and Constructions of Nostalgia in Chopin’s Mazurkas - Halina Goldberg (Indiana University)

"Chopin used the slow mazurka—the kind widely but anachronistically called kujawiak—to summon nostalgia for the spatially and temporally distant—and mythical—Poland. But rather than referencing his homeland through the supposed identity of this dance, Chopin invokes it through musical styles and gestures typical of then-popular characteristic pieces typically marked by the adjectives pathétique, elegique, lugubre, triste, or mélancolique." (Halina Goldberg)


2. Ferruccio Busoni and the “Halfness” of Fryderyk Chopin: A Study about Gender Perception and Performance Interpretation - Erinn Knyt (University of Massachusetts)

"My analysis of a previously unpublished and un-translated essay by Busoni, “Chopin: eine Ansicht über ihn,” in conjunction with analyses of recordings, concert programs, and recital reviews, connects Busoni’s unconventional Chopin interpretations to an idiosyncratic perception of Chopin’s character. Busoni’s essay shows that he too acknowledged a “poetic,” “feminine,” and “emotive” side in the music commonly attributed to effeminate perceptions of Chopin at the time. Yet he simultaneously perceived “half- manly” and “half-dramatic” elements in the music and in Chopin’s character—that is, a heroic monumental side—as well. What he strove to portray in his interpretations was the “whole” of Chopin and his music. He sought to distance himself from the gendered “halfness,” as he called it, which informed contemporaneous interpretations. In so doing, he became a pioneer of Chopin programming and interpretation." (Errin Knyt)

3. The Institution of the International Chopin Piano Competition and Its Social and Cultural Implications -
Tony Lin (University of California, Berkeley)

"By examining the competition’s founding, sponsorships, participants and public reception, I show that what began as an effort to understand Chopin’s music better became much more than a musical affair. I argue that Poles continue to appropriate Chopin for political purposes, as they did in partitioned Poland, where cultural artifacts such as Chopin’s music were critical because they came to constitute the “Polishness” for which the Poles were desperately searching. .. Even though Chopin is now a household name internationally, his music was less popular both inside and outside of Poland prior to 192 7. The competition has played an instrumental role in strengthening the image of Chopin as Poland’s national “bard” while exporting this image to the wider world." (Tony Lin)

Also on November 1, 2012, the Society for Music Theory featured a session on "Schumann and Chopin" with two papers on Chopin:

1. Sonata Form in Chopin: An Evolutionary Perspective - Andrew I. Aziz (Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester)

2. Modeling a Physical Dominant Transformational Relation in Chopin—the Handnetz - James Bungert (University of Wisconsin-Madison)

Another session, on "Gesture and Music", held on November 2, 2012, started from a paper about Chopin by Margaret Britton (University of Texas at Austin): Four Gestural Types in Chopin’s Mazurka in C-sharp Minor, Op. 50, no. 3.

Those who wanted to hear Chopin played, instead of listening to scholars talking about him, had a treat on Saturday, November 3, 2012. The noon Lecture Recital by Sezi Seskir (Bucknell University) was entitled "Stolen Time: Temporal Shaping through Musical Markings in the Nineteenth Century." The lecture-recital used examples of tempo rubato in the music of Chopin, Schumann and Brahms.

"After 1828 Chopin started using the term rubato in his scores, yet this was not the only license he gave the performer in matters of flexible time. Similar to Schumann and later Brahms, he provided a richer vocabulary of markings in his scores to inform the performers more precisely about his musical intentions. A close study of these markings in light of treatises from the early nineteenth century reveals indications not only about change of dynamic and touch but also about a flexible treatment of time that can help the performer shape music expressively, enabling moments of intimacy to be created in a threshold of regular pulse. The fantasy as a genre welcomes the use of tempo rubato more than any other, owing to its looser, more flexible form. The Polonaise-Fantasie, op. 61 of Frédéric Chopin,  the first movement of Schumann’s Fantasy in C major, op. 17, and Seven Fantasias op. 116, nos. 1 and 4 of Johannes Brahms offer interesting examples of the rich and detailed use of accentuation markings that serve to inspire the player to use a subtle amount of flexibility of time." (Sezi Seskir)